


tell me that you love me (even if it's fake)

by groundopenwide



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M, shadowhunters au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-24
Updated: 2016-04-24
Packaged: 2018-06-04 06:09:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6644443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/groundopenwide/pseuds/groundopenwide
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i><b>I’ll look after Niall. You have my word.</b> It was the closest to <b>I care about him, too,</b> that Zayn had ever gotten, and it hadn’t been enough. Of course it hadn’t. Because Niall loved Harry more than he would ever love anything, and Zayn’s feelings weren’t enough to change that fact. They were never going to be.</i>
</p><p>For the tumblr prompt: "Ziall as Saphael" (from Shadowhunters).</p>
            </blockquote>





	tell me that you love me (even if it's fake)

**Author's Note:**

> literally just blame this all on the anon who came into my askbox and got me thinking ((crying)) about ziall as saphael. that's the only explanation i have for this.
> 
> if you don't watch shadowhunters this probably won't make any sense?? but basically: shadowhunters are the ~good guys~ who fight demons, mundanes are boring old humans, and vampires are just...vampires. yeah.
> 
> title taken from "idfc" by blackbear, aka the ultimate simon/raphael song.

Things were always going to end up this way; Zayn can see that now.

Niall loves that Harry boy more than he loves himself, would do anything for him. Would die for him, if it came down to it. Zayn’s known that since the beginning, since the very first time Niall ever went running out of the DuMort to go help his shadowhunter friends. It’s always for Harry. Zayn had deluded himself, thinking that Niall had stayed with the clan for any other reason except to serve as a kind of ‘inside man’ for the Institute. He never cared about any of them. He never cared about _Zayn._  

Never mind the fact that Zayn hadn’t felt anything for anyone- hadn’t _felt,_ period- in over sixty years. Not until the day a bumbling, over-talkative blonde boy ended up in his hands, first to be killed and then to be _saved._

 _You mean nothing,_ Zayn had spat that day, staring into Niall’s shining, grateful face. But the statement had been more for himself than anyone else, a desperate plea: _he can’t mean anything to you, you can’t let him. It won’t end well. Love never does._

As hard as he tried, though, it wasn’t to be; Niall kept coming back, and Zayn kept on _letting him._ He kept Niall safe, in his own twisted way, kept him from Camille, who had been the one to create this whole mess in the first place. He pushed and pushed and pushed Niall away, all for the sake of his wellbeing, for the sake of his _life._

Until the day he couldn’t anymore.

From the moment Zayn heard that last faint thump of Niall’s heartbeat, he knew. He knew that Harry would bring him back, even if that mean bringing him back as a monster, something wicked and detestable and awful enough that Niall would hate himself even more than any mundane or shadowhunter ever would. He’d hate himself for _eternity._ He’d have to live lifetime after lifetime of self-loathing, of the unbearable urge to _drink,_ of never being able to see the sun rise again. But Harry wouldn’t think about any of that- why would he? He was a shadowhunter. A boy who had lost his best friend. Staking Niall in the heart wasn’t even an option, not for someone who was supposed to be one of the _good guys._

 _I’ll look after Niall. You have my word._ It was the closest to _I care about him, too,_ that Zayn had ever gotten, and it hadn’t been enough. Of course it hadn’t. Because Niall loved Harry more than he would ever love anything, and Zayn’s feelings weren’t enough to change that fact. They were never going to be. 

Zayn had learned a long, long, time ago that feelings were just extra baggage, another thing to make his endless life even more insufferable. The knowledge should have been enough to stop him, to stop him from caring, or at least to stop him from making that care _known._ Except Niall made him stupid, made him _feel_ like he hadn’t since he was still human, and Zayn was high on it- blinded by Niall’s smile, struck dumb by his fierce determination to help others, even if that meant risking himself. He was high enough that he’d begun to hallucinate, thinking that intense loyalty would ever extend to _him._

 _I’m disappointed in you,_  Zayn had said, and Niall had just looked at him, soft and sad and a little devastated.

What he hadn’t known was that, in reality, Zayn was just disappointed in himself.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm also on [tumblr](http://groundopenwide.tumblr.com)


End file.
